Elder Of Ziyon - Israel News

Thursday, February 06, 2014

Iran's "moderate" Foreign Minister meeting with Islamic Jihad terrorists

Secretary General of Islamic Jihad Ramadan Abdullah met today with Iran's Foreign Minister, Mohammad-Javad Zarif.

Zarif noted that "enemies" have failed to divert the world's attention from the Palestinian issue. Presumably he means with such unimportant issues like Syria.

He complimented "Islamic resistance in Palestine" (i. e., terrorism) as uniting various Palestinian factions.

Zarif made headlines a couple of days ago with purported statements that the Nazi Holocaust against Jews was "tragically cruel and should not happen again." In a little reported followup, Iranian officials denied these statements.

The Islamic Jihad leader also met with Ali Larjani, chairman of the Parliament of Iran, who said "Fighting the Zionist entity is the only way to fulfill the rights and liberate Palestinian land."

UC Berkeley professor forcing students to tweet against "Islamophobia"

From Tarek Fatah in The Toronto Sun:

Two weeks ago, I received a panicked message from a student enrolled at the University of California, Berkeley.

He wrote: “I’ve been told by one of my professors I will be required, as part of my grade, to start a Twitter account and tweet weekly on Islamophobia. I can’t help but feel this is unethical. This is his agenda not mine.”

The professor conducting this exercise was Hatem Bazian as part of a course titled, “Asian American Studies 132AC: Islamophobia”.

When I asked him to elaborate on his concerns the student wrote: “There are 100 students in the class, all of us forced to create individual Twitter accounts. I’m not wholly clear on what our final project is yet (I find it very interesting that he excludes both the Twitter account requirement AND the final project from his official syllabus), but we have to meet with a group in San Francisco, and our class will be surveying people of color on the impact of some ads put out by (anti-Sharia blogger) Pamela Gellar. Now I’m no Pamela Gellar fan, I think she’s nuts, but I feel ... between the Twitter stuff and the final project he’s basically using us as unpaid labor to work on his agenda.”

I wrote to Prof. Bazian, who co-founded “Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP)” at Berkeley, asking why he was using his students to pursue what appeared to me to be a political exercise meant to propagate a specific message to the Twitterverse.

Bazian replied, without referring to Islamophobia:

“My course is designated as an American culture community engagement scholarship class … Students are asked to send at least one posting per week on something related to the course content, be it from the actual reading or anything they read or came across.”

When I asked him why all the tweets by his students so far are about Islamophobia, he replied:

“The class is titled De-Constructing Islamophobia and the History of Otherness … (Students) are asked to post based on … examining Islamophobia through looking at earlier historical examples.”

The fact remains Prof. Bazian appears to be using his position of authority to make 100 students — mostly non-Muslims — tweet about Muslim victimhood in America, irrespective of how it’s defined or whether it exists.

No student I have seen on Twitter has yet posted a tweet saying Islamophobia is a myth, nor has any student challenged the validity of the term.

Here is a sampling of tweets by Prof. Bazian’s students:

One tweeted: “How difficult it is to be a Muslim woman in America”; Another wrote about “Islamophobia in Canada”; while a third tweeted, “One perspective of Islam is to view it as inferior to the West. Where does this notion of cultural superiority come from?”

Bazian's history should make him ineligible for any academic position whatsoever - even Berkeley - in a sane world.

In May 2002, Bazian was the sole speaker for a two-day event at San Francisco's George Washington High School so inflammatory as to generate formal letters of apology from the school administration to the public. Advertised as a Middle Eastern "cultural assembly," the event featured a rap song by a student comparing Zionists to Nazis as students ran back and forth with Palestinian flags. Student and faculty observers called the supposedly multicultural event "pure pro-Palestinian propaganda."

In October of 2002, at the University of Michigan, at the Palestinian Solidarity Movement's annual conference, Bazian shared a forum with revisionist historian Ilan Pappé and the now-jailed academic and terrorist fundraiser Sami Al-Arian of Florida Atlantic University. At Michigan and elsewhere Bazian consistently denies being an anti-Semite, calling the accusation a ploy of opponents. "(The charge of) anti-Semitism is used as a means of neutralizing the opposition so the mainstream American public will distance itself from the 'extremists.'"

Yet, Steven Emerson, in his book American Jihad, quotes Bazian sermonizing at the American Muslim Alliance conference in May 1999 in Santa Clara, California, promoting the Islamic State of Palestine. Excerpts from the quote read, "'In the Hadith, the Day of Judgment will never happen until you fight the Jews ... and the stones will say, 'Oh Muslim, there is a Jew hiding behind me. Come and kill him!'"

Also:

At an April 10, 2004 anti-war rally in San Francisco, Bazian told the cheering crowd, “we’re sitting here and watching the world pass by, people being bombed, and it’s about time that we have an intifada in this country that change[s] fundamentally the political dynamics in here.” He added: “They’re gonna say, ‘some Palestinian being too radical’ — well, you haven’t seen radicalism yet!”

After a 2002 Students for Justice in Palestine rally at UC Berkeley resulted in the arrest of 79 protesters, Bazian spoke at a follow-up rally protesting the arrests. "If you want to know where the pressure on the university [i.e., to prosecute the demonstrators] is coming from, look at the Jewish names on the school buildings," he said.

Isn't that interesting that a leading expert on "Islamophobia" has an anti-Jewish agenda?

(h/t Ishai)

A Gaza businessman hugs an Israeli colleague - and Arabs freak out

Once in a while private Gaza businessmen meet Israelis . Some of them need to import goods to Gaza; sometimes COGAT arranges for them to attend trade shows or training.

A couple of days ago, at one of these meetings, an apparent Israeli soldier hugged and effusively greeted many of the Arabs from Gaza that he knew.

Arabs could not stand the idea of an Arab hugging an Israeli.

The video spread on Arab social media, "causing great resentment among activists who said this is normalization that should not happen."

Some activists - and journalists - called for the businessmen to be put on trial, and for the Gaza government to make these sorts of meetings illegal.

The PA Ministry of Civil Affairs, which helped organize the meeting, was caught on the defensive. They confirmed the meeting, which was held at the Erez crossing, saying that it was a business meeting to debate the problems of the Gaza Strip and the issues of the blockade of the introduction of construction materials and oil and gas and food, and that this video misrepresents the atmosphere.

Maher Abu Alouf, Director General of the Ministry of Civil Affairs said that these meetings are publicly known but are not friendly nor are they a form of normalization, and he expressed disapproval of the misrepresentations by some activists and the media.

Ali Al-Hayek is the person seen hugging the uniformed Israeli. He is one of Gaza's most prominent representatives of the Palestinian private sector. Hayek claimed that the person he embraced was retired from the army, and that it was strange that the media showed footage of them being civil to each other but did not show footage of the arguments by Palestinians for the introduction of the materials to the Gaza Strip, in full coordination between the private sector and governments in Ramallah and Gaza.

"Normalization" is one of the worst things Arabs can accuse each other of.

Think about that for a while.

UPDATE: The soldier is General Eithan Dangot of COGAT who is retiring, this was a lunch in his honor. (h/t Yenta Press)

02/05 Link Pt2: The Darker Side Of Oxfam; Boycotts Are Driven By Hate; 9 Narrow Miles

From Ian:

The darker side of Oxfam

But lurking behind this carefully-crafted website, and indeed the spokesman’s carefully-worded statement, is a rather different reality.
In truth, Oxfam channels charity funds to political groups which follow deeply partisan agendas, and support the boycott of Israel.
Over the last few years, Oxfam GB and the Dutch branch of the charity, Oxfam Novib, have granted many tens of thousands pounds to Coalition of Women for Peace (CWP).
This group is linked to whoprofits.org, a website that publicly identifies boycott targets, including Israeli banks, utility providers and companies like SodaStream.

Divest This!: A Panic-Driven Response to Omar Barghouti

As the leader of a “movement” that has accomplished next to nothing in close to fifteen years, Omar Barghouti seems to have developed special vision powers (perhaps learned while studying at an Israeli school he insists everyone in the world but he should boycott). These powers allow him to see panic-stricken Israeli supporters on all sides that quiver in perpetual fear of BDS’s explosive growth that always seems to arrive in the form of a damp squib.
Barghouti’s latest New York Times piece (paired with a “rebuttal” by Hirsh Goodman which declares Israel to be guilty, but urges something other than boycotting as a punishment – great diversity of opinion Grey Lady!) demonstrates all the rhetoric ticks that give BDS staying power despite lack of concrete victory (incidental or otherwise).
Thus 16% of the American Studies Association’s membership voting for an academic boycott is a “landslide vote” while the stunning backlash against the boycott from across the academy goes unmentioned. Or perhaps that is just part of the panicked response of Israeli supporters? (Keep in mind that in the heads-I-win-tails-you-lose world of BDS, both the BDSers own activity and the overwhelmingly negative response it generates counts as a victories for them.) (h/t Yenta Press)

Answering Roger’s questions

The other day you posted an open letter to Neil Young and Scarlett Johansson on your Facebook page. This letter was primarily made up of a series of questions regarding the Palestinian employees of SodaStream’s factory in Ma’ale Adumim, addressed to Ms Johansson.
I see that neither Neil Young or Scarlett Johansson has offered you any answers to these questions, so I thought I might have a go.
There are several hundred Palestinians employed at this particular factory, I don’t know each of their particular circumstances, so I have taken my lead from the people interviewed in this recent article, and this video.

Iranian women need written permission from their husbands before traveling abroad

From Al Monitor:

Mahboubeh, a 62-year-old Iranian schoolteacher, was forbidden from traveling outside the country a couple of weeks ago. She has been separated from her husband for three years, after what she describes as over three decades of constant fighting. Since her husband has not agreed to divorce her, he has taken revenge by preventing her from leaving the country, even for a short trip to the United Arab Emirates with a couple of her old friends. Mahboubeh told Al-Monitor she’s fed up with the system that hands over so much authority to men, allowing them to rule women’s lives, even when they are no longer living under the same roof.

Married Iranian women, even if they hold a valid passport, require their husband’s permission to depart the country, regardless of age. For obtaining or renewing a passport, a notarized permit from the spouse is required. Husbands can easily refrain from allowing their wives to obtain or renew their passport.

But this is an improvement over a recently rescinded law that gave the same restrictions on single women.

...Mehdi Davatgari, an Iranian MP and member of the Majles’ National Security and Foreign Policy Committee, told ISNA news agency, "It is an achievement of the Majles that single Iranian women over the age of 18 can obtain a passport with their father or grandfather’s official permission. Thus, contrary to the previous requirement, once a woman has her passport, she is cleared to exit the country, and there is no need for male permission to be obtained for every departure."

According to Davatgari, this measure would save a considerable amount of red tape. However, if the male supervisor feels strongly about the woman’s travel and is against it, predicting “wrong-doing or misconduct,” he could submit a request to the government to prevent her from leaving the country.

Fatemeh Rahbar, head of the Majles' Women and Family Affairs Committee, also gave her two cents on the matter, saying that the number of women who have misbehaved while traveling outside Iranian borders is too small to restrict every woman's travels: "Around 76 women who have traveled outside the country have behaved inappropriately, and therefore are forbidden from departure without an eligible male's notarized permission for each individual trip. Passports are equal to international birth certificates and cannot be denied to women, unless there is hard evidence proving a woman’s misbehavior outside the country, which we obviously take quite seriously.”

Shahla Mirgalou-Bayat, a physician and member of the Majles' Women and Family Affairs Committee, said passing and implementing these regulations are vital to protecting women and ensuring their safety while traveling.

In a recent interview, Mirgalou-Bayat said that since men could easily tend to their sexual needs through concubines and women cannot, it is safer for women to travel only if they must, and only if cleared by their male guardian. Mirgalou-Bayat added, “Women have different desires and needs than men, and implementing further restrictions for women is actually beneficial to women themselves. I approach this fact as a physician, from a physiological standpoint and considering the difference between male and female bodies.”

(h/t Anne)

Fun with imaginary numbers: Israel released almost 12,000 prisoners last 3 years!

Hamas' Al Qassam Brigades translates and publishes some new "statistics" from the PA Ministry of Prisoner Affairs (also at IMEMC):

Head of the Census Department at the Palestinian Ministry of Detainees, Abdul-Nasser Ferwana, said that Israeli occupation is currently holding captive around 4800 Palestinians in seventeen prisons, detention and interrogation centers.

Ferwana said that around 11034 Palestinians, including 2500 children, have been taken prisoner by the Israeli army over the last three years, during ongoing Israeli military invasions and violations in occupied Palestine.

According to B'Tselem, at the end of 2010 there were 5,705 prisoners. At the end of 2013 there were 4,768. If Israel imprisoned "around" 11,034 Palestinian Arabs in the past three years, that means that they have released an astonishing 11,971 prisoners in that time period!

It also means that the Israeli prisons must have especially fast revolving doors.

The lies don't end there, of course:

Ferwana also stated that Israeli occupation continues to deny ailing detainees the right to professional and specialized medical treatment, and said that there are 1500 detainees suffering with various conditions, including cancer, while others completely lost their mobility and various bodily functions.

Wow - 1500 of the 4800 prisoners are seriously ill? Then the mortality rate among prisoners must be super high, right?

As for detainees who died after their arrest, Ferwana stated that 205 detainees died since 1967, the causes of death range between excessive torture during interrogation, the lack of adequate medical treatment, and the excessive use of force.

Um...in 46 years, 205 prisoners died. That's less than five a year. How can it be that over 30% have serious medical conditions, but only 0.1% die every year?

This means (assuming roughly 5000 prisoners on the average since 1967, even though the numbers before 2001 were significantly lower) that the mortality rate among Arabs in Israeli prisons is at least four times better than they are outside of prison.

Dozens of Palestinians died shortly after their release from prison due to health complications resulting from the lack, and in many cases, the absence of medical attention in Israeli prisons, among them are detainees Morad Abu Sakout, Hayel Abu Zeid, Ashraf Abu Threi, Fayez Zeidat and Zakariyya Issa.

They don't die in Israeli prisons, but as soon as they can access professional medical facilities in the territories, then they drop dead?

Ferwana called on media outlets to provide further coverage on the issue of the detainees, their suffering and the ongoing violations, mental and physical abuse they face in Israeli prisons.

I think that is a great idea. The media really should report on these numbers. And they should bring in a statistician to do the analysis to see if they add up or if Ferwana is blowing smoke.

02/05 Link Pt1: Rogues’ gallery vying to replace Falk; Iran's Missile Program Continues Under Deal

From Ian:

UN Watch: The rogues’ gallery to replace Richard Falk

The 47-nation council, which just welcomed China, Cuba, Russia and Saudi Arabia to its ranks, will be replacing Falk — an open supporter of Hamas and of 9/11 conspiracy theories — at the end of its upcoming March session.
And so like moths to a flame, a rogues’ gallery of anti-Israel activists and academics are clamoring to take over a position that, even according to Amnesty International, is inherently biased against the Jewish state.
While the title of the post is “Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights on Palestinian territories occupied since 1967,” implying a regional jurisdiction, in fact the mandate – unchanged since February 1993 — is unique in the UN system for its exclusive focus on alleged abuses committed by one side, Israel; and by the presumption, in contempt of basic due process, that Israel will always be found guilty.

Mr. Kerry, the Israeli economy is no illusion

In recent weeks several emerging markets have seen their currencies come crashing down with a bang. One after the other they dropped, among them the Turkish lira, which led Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan to raise the interest rate to an especially high 11 percent. In Argentina, the local currency has plummeted. And in Israel? Bank of Israel Governor Karnit Flug is taking an aggressive hands-on approach, selling shekels to all buyers. In other words -- she is buying dollars in large quantities. These are problems you want to have. Israel has an enormous cash reserve of some $80 billion. If we were really being boycotted the foreign investors would be the first to smell it and the shekel would collapse. The interest rates on Israel government bonds would skyrocket due to the hazardous risk. We would not be able to exist in conditions of a 1% interest rate on the shekel.

Four Palestinians ‘planned shooting attack at wedding party’

Four East Jerusalem Palestinians were indicted Wednesday for planning to carry out a large-scale shooting attack at a popular event hall in the city. All four suspects, aged 19-21, were charged with conspiracy to aid an enemy in wartime.
According to the indictment, filed with the Jerusalem District Court and made public Wednesday, two of the four suspects, residents of the East Jerusalem neighborhood of Jabel Mukaber, planned to dress as ultra-Orthodox Jews, enter a wedding or other event at Jerusalem’s “Nof” hall in the Bait Vagan neighborhood concealing firearms beneath their clothes, then open fire at the guests.

Lies about Israel vs. the truth about Fatah

A few years ago there was an antisemitic play that received some publicity from the usual idiotic crowd. The BBC called it "brilliant." It was called Seven Jewish Children, by Caryl Churchill.

The entire format of the play was supposedly how Jews think, in terms of what they teach their children. A small sample:

Tell her about the family of dead girls, tell her their names why
not, tell her the whole world knows why shouldn’t she know? tell
her there’s dead babies, did she see babies? tell her she’s got
nothing to be ashamed of. Tell her they did it to themselves. Tell
her they want their children killed to make people sorry for them,
tell her I’m not sorry for them, tell her not to be sorry for them,
tell her we’re the ones to be sorry for, tell her they can’t talk
suffering to us. Tell her we’re the iron fist now, tell her it’s the fog
of war, tell her we won’t stop killing them till we’re safe, tell her I
laughed when I saw the dead policemen, tell her they’re animals
living in rubble now, tell her I wouldn’t care if we wiped them out,
the world would hate us is the only thing, tell her I don’t care if
the world hates us, tell her we’re better haters, tell her we’re
chosen people, tell her I look at one of their children covered in
blood and what do I feel? tell her all I feel is happy it’s not her.
Don’t tell her that.

Today, Palestinian Media Watch translates something on the Fatah Facebook page also about what they want to teach their children. But this isn't a fictionalized, racist account of the mindset of Arabs - this is what the "moderate" Fatah party, led by Mahmoud Abbas, really thinks:

Teach your children to love the soil.
Teach them that we live in misery.
Teach them that there is a seed in the soil;
if you water it with blood,
it will sprout a revolution.

Will anyone write a play based on reality rather than the fevered dreams of Israel-haters?

Saeb Erekat's "Canaanite" lies - the video

Based on this post:

(h/t Yoel)

Infighting in Hamas

YNet reports:

For several days, Hamas forces stationed near the security fence between the Gaza Strip and Israel to prevent rocket fire on Israel were gone from their posts; behind the scenes, a drama unfolded in the strip.

Last weekend, the rocket prevention forces – deployed to deter the numerous factions in Gaza from undoing the relative calm between Israel and Hamas – withdrew from their positions, returning to their posts on Tuesday morning.

Palestinian sources said that the matter was not one of tactical indecision, but internal disagreements regarding the proper response to IDF operations. A document obtained by Ynet confirmed that in the end, the moderate elements prevailed.

The affair began Thursday night, when the Israeli Air Force attacked three Gaza Strip targets belonging to the military wing of Hamas. Some of the targets held large reserves of rockets, which were destroyed in the attack.

The following day, the military wing of Hamas announced a withdrawal of the forces along the security barrier. The forces, numbering around 900 soldiers, were posted two weeks ago to search passing vehicles in order to prevent additional rockets being fired on Israel.

The forces' withdrawal could only have one meaning: Hamas was preparing to launch rockets in response to the IDF attack – despite the decision of the political wing of Hamas. These insights were published Tuesday morning in the Arab daily Asharq Al-Awsat; Palestinian sources confirmed the events to Ynet.

A security source said that the leadership of the military wing felt that it was losing its popular support in the public, especially given the criticism received by Islamic Jihad, who had called for shooting rockets towards Israel in response to IDF attacks.

He noted that the military leadership of Hamas did not want to be seen as a moderate entity that supports restraint and prevents a military response against Israel – fearing that such a position would weaken their standing next to Islamic Jihad.

However the intention of the military wing to attack caused a conflict between it and the political wing that required the involvement of Hamas Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh and the movement's political chief Khaled Meshaal.

The Palestinian sources said that Haniyeh sided with Meshaal and the two worked together to coax the military leadership away from its decision to respond with rocket fire. The two leaders worried that such a rocket barrage could lead to the collapse of the relative calm, and maybe even to IDF operations within the Gaza Strip.

The quick involvement of the political echelon bore fruit, and on Tuesday Hamas' Interior Ministry announced, that the forces were redeployed along the security barrier to maintain the peace.

The document was written on Saturday, less than a day after the first withdrawal. The letter is written to Abu Ubaidah al-Jarrah, the commander of the national security forces of Hamas, and emphasizes that aggressive action must be taken against anyone who attempts to launch rockets.

Hamas has already clarified that it is not interested in an escalation on the border. The terrorist organization sent such a message to Israel through Egypt after five rockets were fired at Ashkelon in January. That particular barrage led to a conference meeting of the numerous Palestinian factions, in which participants were told they must maintain restrain to prevent further Israeli attacks on the Gaza Strip.

The meeting ended with the understanding that all factions were committed to the restraint tactic, though that very night a rocket was fired from the Strip. Hamas was furious with the launchers, who most likely belonged to Islamic Jihad, and the movement announced that it will aggressively operate against anyone who tries to launch rockets towards Israel.

Ask any clueless "Middle East expert" what Israel needs to do to minimize rocket and other terror attacks:

1) Withdraw from territory
2) Negotiate a peace agreement
3) Maintain an uncompromising military posture that the Palestinian Arabs respect

The gap between the truth and the conventional wisdom is more like a canyon.

SodaStream CEO destroys Oxfam official on BBC

This is so great:

I also like when the clueless BBC host says that Judea and Samaria is "territory seized from another country." Which country was that, again? And were that country's claims on the West Bank legal under international law?

Another point that I've been noticing lately is that the Israel haters - and I'm including the Oxfam representative here - purposely conflate "settlements" with Area C. The two are not identical. Settlements take up perhaps 4% of Area C, which, as Birnbaum points out, is administered by Israel under existing agreements with the PA.

The disingenuous statement of Oxfam that it is not against Israel is also fairly bogus, because it funds many organizations that advocate a total boycott of Israel. It has an "ambassador" who also advocates BDS.

If Oxfam supports Israel's right to exist as much as it opposes the "settlements" then it should distance itself from Desmond Tutu as much as it distanced itself from Scarlett Johansson. Yet - it wouldn't ever do that. Which speaks volumes as to how much it believes that Israel is legitimate within the "1967 lines."

The video, however, is priceless.

02/04 Links Pt2: Wiesel- People are no longer ashamed to be anti-Semites; A PA BDS Fail

From Ian:

Elie Wiesel: People are no longer ashamed to be anti-Semites

"The Holocaust is a unique event, but it has a universal significance which must be memorized incessantly," he says, voicing concerns over the temptation of Iran's nuclear ability and the civil war in Syria, which has already claimed a price of 150,000 deaths. And the world is silent.
The unstoppable conversation between us has been going on for several years now, but the murky wave of anti-Semitism sweeping over the Western world, as well as Eastern Europe (with the recent incidents in Hungary and Ukraine), are fresh and extract statements with despair running through them.
"Unfortunately, anti-Semitism still exists," Wiesel says. "It has been alive for more than 2,000 years, and will likely continue living. I thought that the memory of the Holocaust would shame those boasting anti-Semitic opinions. I was wrong. It still exists in different countries, and it seems people are no longer ashamed to be anti-Semitic."

At SodaStream, Palestinians hope their bubble won’t burst

“There are no job opportunities in the West Bank,” Fares told The Times of Israel. “Even the jobs that do exist pay no more than NIS 1,500-2,000 ($430-570) a month.” Fares now earns triple those sums.
Many educated women like Fares were forced to seek work outside the home following the outbreak of the Second Intifada in 2000 to support the household as the Palestinian economy collapsed, she explained.
Fares’s husband, a first lieutenant in the Palestinians’ prestigious Preventive Security Force, earns NIS 2,000 ($570) per month after 10 years of service.

PA Report: Palestinians Prefer to Buy 'Blue and White'

Last month, BDS (Boycott, Divest, Sanction) activists slammed Palestinian Authority chief Mahmoud Abbas for not joining in with them to boycott Israel – and on Monday, the PA revealed just how uninvolved it was in the BDS movement. According to a PA report, 70% of the PA's imports were from Israel, with imports worth $3.5 billion entering the Authority from Israel.
It should be noted that Israel generally does not restrict imports of consumer goods to the PA, and that Israeli goods compete on Palestinian store shelves with goods from Arab countries and Europe as well as from the PA. Rather, it is the Palestinian consumer who is driving the push for Israeli goods in the PA, Palestinian merchants said. (h/t Bob Knot)

Financial Times has a meltdown over SodaStream model of co-existence

First, the SodaStream factory is located in an industrial park within greater Ma’ale Adumim and, even according to Peace Now, only 0.5% of the settlement territory was built on Palestinian land. Additionally, while the fate of the disputed territory will be decided by negotiations between the two parties, it’s important to note that Ehud Olmert’s generous offer to Mahmoud Abbas in 2008, which included a contiguous Palestinian State in 93% of the West Bank, included Ma’ale Adumim as part of Israel.
Further, the phrase “Arab East Jerusalem” is of course a misnomer, as the only time “East Jerusalem” was ‘Arab’ (that is, 100% Jew-free) and separated arbitrarily between “East” and “West” in its entire history was between 1949 and 1967, the short period when Jordan controlled that part of the city (after expelling all the Jews).